Month: March 2017

Last October it was announced that the UK government may derogate from the ECHR in relation to future armed conflicts (see EJIL-Talk analysis here). This prompted the (UK Parliamentary) Joint Committee on Human Rights to launch an inquiry into this matter, details of which may be found on its web site (here). The JCHR called for written submissions on the matter.

I made a written submission (which I hope will appear on the JCHR’s web site soon, along with other submissions). I set out an extract from my submission below (please note footnotes are not included, I am happy to send a copy of my submission to anyone who contacts me: epb3@le.ac.uk)

My submission addresses whether extra-territorial derogations from the ECHR are permissible, and on what basis. I argue that they are, but that their special context requires consideration in relation to the validity of any individual derogation.

With the UK’s relations with Europe in such a state of flux, a few words may be in order on the UK government’s position toward (i) UK membership of the ECHR, and (ii) repeal of the Human Rights Act 1998. The last few years has seen so much speculation on these issues that even UK-based academics may struggle to keep up, or perhaps the better word is ‘decipher’, what the current position is. This is an attempt to do so.

The UK and the ECHR: no immediate plans for withdrawal

Current position: the UK government has ‘no plans to withdraw’ from the ECHR (1 Feb 2017, statement by David Jones, Minister for ‘Brexit’: here (col 1131)).